Dallas: Spinster Records

There are record stores, and then there are record stores that double as a neighborhood’s living room. Spinster Records in Dallas’s Bishop Arts District is the second kind.

Spinster Records Dallas opened in 2014, first at 829 W. Davis Street before relocating in 2019 to 408 N. Bishop Avenue — right in the thick of Bishop Arts. The move took over what had been Ginger Fox’s Art Gallery and turned it into a record shop with the same energy the gallery had. The Bishop Arts District was the right fit — a neighborhood built around independent businesses, walkability, and the idea that commerce and culture ought to share a building. Spinster Records landed there and stayed.

Vinyl, Hardware, and a Weekly Stage

The stock runs from new and vintage vinyl to turntables, hi-fi audio hardware, apparel, books, and jewelry. But what sets Spinster apart is what happens after the bins close. The shop hosts in-store performances, book signings, and music industry panels every week. The events bring in locals and touring artists alike, turning the shop floor into a proper small venue on a regular basis. When Dallas’s music community needs a room to think out loud, Spinster Records tends to be that room.

For another Oak Cliff record institution — one that’s been on West Jefferson since 1956 and became a nonprofit music archive along the way — Top Ten Records is a few blocks away and worth the walk. And for DFW’s longest-running record store of all, Fort Worth’s Record Town has been doing this since 1957. But Spinster Records carries the present tense — and in Bishop Arts, that’s the whole point.